Former Supervisor and mayoral candidate Aaron Peskin may be gone from City Hall, but he and his allies are still trying to impose their vision of development policy on San Francisco. Together with some longtime supporters, he’s been pushing an effort to turn almost the whole of North Beach into a monster historic district to be added to the National Register of Historic Places. Property owners and housing advocates argue that this is another oblique move to block housing development and that supporters have been playing hide-the-ball with inadequate outreach.
The proposal, introduced last June, covers a large area in the northeastern part of San Francisco along Columbus Ave., from Chestnut and Mason Streets in the north to Sansome and Washington Streets in the south. If it were to succeed, hundreds of properties in the area could again face obstacles to redevelopment that had been eased by recent state legislation to make it easier to build housing. An intervention by Mayor Daniel Lurie has held the plan at bay— for now.
According to its website, the official sponsor of the campaign is the Northeast San Francisco Conservancy, a nonprofit formed to “oversee worthy neighborhood projects and protect open spaces, trees and gardens, parks, public vistas, and historic resources. It may acquire and hold land or conservation easements as necessary in carrying out its mission.” Among its sponsoring groups is the Telegraph Hill Dwellers, a powerful neighborhood group of which Peskin served as president before entering electoral politics. Nancy Shanahan, Peskin’s spouse and a longtime board member of the Dwellers, is the Conservancy’s president. Given Peskin and Shanahan’s history of interventions in property dealings in the district, the Conservancy’s mission statement of acquiring land or easements could be concerning.
Consultant Katharine Petrin, who created the application, is a co-founder of Neighborhoods United SF. Under Peskin’s tutelage, this political group campaigned against state-mandated zoning changes approved by the city during the last election cycle.
In a memorandum to San Francisco’s Historic Preservation Commission issued for consideration at their Jan. 15 meeting, staff at the San Francisco Planning Department praised the general aims of the proposal but criticized multiple issues, such as boundaries that are “expansive, leading to a proposed historic district that lacks continuity and cohesion” and requiring “more explanation as to how they were selected,” and that the proposal “lacks a comprehensive discussion of (historical) integrity” of included buildings, and makes no mention of many smaller historic districts which it would overlap.
At that meeting, members of the commission disclosed that they had received lobbying calls from Peskin in support of the proposal; meanwhile, his successor, District 3 Supervisor Danny Sauter, testified that his office fielded “many questions from constituents, who are getting paperwork at the last minute in the mail and they’ve come to our office with questions, that we have done our best to walk them through and answer, but there’s a lot here that is murky.”
Sauter also noted that his office had not received any notice or briefing on the proposal, which included several properties he described needing revitalization, including a large, twice-burnt-out former hotel with ground-floor retail at the corner of Union and Columbus Streets.
Sauter asked the commission to urge the California State Historical Resources Commission, which had been set to consider the plan on Feb. 7, to grant more time to consider revisions. So did Blair Helsing, president of North Beach Neighbors, during public comment. Nick Ferris, the president of the Telegraph Hill Dwellers, spoke in support of the proposal.
Ultimately, the city commission voted to forward a resolution supporting the Planning Department staff recommendations to the State Historical Resources Commission. However, at Mayor Daniel Lurie’s request last week, the item was removed from the state commission’s agenda. A spokesperson for the body told The Voice via email, “It is our understanding that the nominator, local government, and interested parties are in discussion regarding the merits of the nomination. The Office of Historic Preservation will add the North Beach Historic District nomination to a future Commission meeting should the nomination be resubmitted and meet the criteria for which it is being considered.”
When The Voice reached Peskin via text on Jan. 29; he indicated he was unaware of the change.
The North Beach proposal is the latest move in a statewide trend of using historic district designations as a loophole to circumvent state laws allowing for greater neighborhood density. In 2022, San Francisco’s St. Francis Wood neighborhood applied for and won support from the California State Historical Resources Commission to receive a historic designation despite vocal opposition from property owners. Two upscale neighborhoods in Los Angeles have also been designated as historic under similar circumstances.
“We watch cities across the state abuse the historic preservation process,” Corey Smith, executive director of the Housing Action Coalition, texted The Voice last week. “This is particularly frustrating because abuse of process exacerbates the affordability and displacement crisis.”
In 2023, the San Mateo Heritage Alliance, along with some residents of San Mateo’s tony Baywood neighborhood, began the process of having it designated as a historic district after new neighbors moved in, remodeled a house, and added an in-law unit. Since then, the city has heard from opposing residents — supporters of preservation versus housing advocates and homeowners concerned about additional financial burdens created by historic designation.
On Jan. 21, the San Mateo City Council considered options for revising the city’s historic preservation ordinance after hearing over an hour of public comment, mostly in opposition to any new proposals. Opponents of updating the ordinance were also opposed to the historic designation for Baywood and argued that both efforts, besides encumbering property owners, could give more impetus to vexatious appeals against projects under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The council eventually voted to approve updating the ordinance with a proviso that no action be taken on a property without the owner’s consent.
“I think this council needs to understand that it is not a decision before the council how CEQA is applied statewide, but also by the city,” Daniel Friedman, a lawyer for a group opposing new regulations, told the council Jan. 21. “The work that is going to be done on these context statements will be used as evidence for CEQA appeals, and this is not something under the council’s control.”
Meanwhile, back in San Francisco, property owners expressed their concerns at an impromptu Jan. 22 meeting of North Beach Neighbors, where Petrin tried to sell members on the North Beach Historic District proposal. Many agitated attendees complained that despite being applied for last summer, most property owners hadn’t heard about the application until this month. Petrin became defensive and attempted to explain away the alleged lack of notice by citing an abundance of holiday mail, as well as the fact that tenancy-in-common owners may not have been included in a notice mailed to property owners in November.
“We’re coming at this in the last minute. It’s unacceptable,” said Jordan Angle, a North Beach property owner, at the meeting. “This process has already been weaponized against many of us in the past, and it’s getting worse.” This prompted Petrin to characterize Angle’s concerns as “[Scott] Wiener words,” referencing the San Francisco state lawmaker who has championed state pro-housing legislation.
“I think the problem is that despite the good intentions, people feel this has been done to them instead of for them. And that just results in anger and suspicion, especially now when so many people feel unheard,” Former District 3 Supervisor Julie Christensen told The Voice at the meeting. “Hopefully it’ll all work out.”
The Voice has reached out to Nancy Shanahan and Katharine Petrin for comment.
